Kondas Centre is a municipal art museum in Viljandi, founded in 2003. Its main area of activity is naive art and outsider art, the Centre is dedicated to one of Estonia’s best-known naivists - Paul Kondas (1900-1985). Paintings by Paul Kondas are displayed at permanent exhibition.
Our centre shares its home with the vicarage of Jaani/St. John's Church, the building is very close to the ruins of Viljandi Order Castle. This imposing red brick house was built in 1895, during 1948-2002 it hosted Viljandi Town Library.
There are four exhibition rooms on the ground floor (each appr. 35 m²) and one room on the first floor. Besides making exhibitions, the Centre collects all kinds of information about naive artists in Estonia.
We offer a wide variety of exhibitions: classic painting and architecture, handcraft, conceptual contemporary art and outsider art - the latter is the main focus of our work. Our mission is to explore, display and popularize Estonian outsider art. Field work to fulfill this task started in 2004 - we try to reach exceptional non-professional artists from all corners of Estonia.
We also organize lectures, conversations and meetings with artists, workshops and educational programs; Kondas Centre provides a meeting place for local art lovers and our visitors for all kinds of occasions.
Kondas Centre is financed by Viljandi Town Government, our activities are supported by the Cultural Endowment of Estonia and the Estonian Gambling Tax Board.
In 2006 seven big concrete strawberries were set on the streets of Viljandi. Strawberries were placed so that their tails would point towards the Kondas Centre. Strawberry has become the symbol of our centre, the idea originates from one of Paul Kondas’ best known paintings – “Strawberry eaters” (1965).
